The Ration Ticket

Excerpt from the diary of Jules Flegmon.

16 February. -- With the decree going into effect on March 1st and the sign-up deadline the 18th, those people relegated by their social situation to partial existence are busy looking for a job which would allow them to be reclassified under the category of full-time livers. But the administration, with diabolical foresight, has forbidden any personnel movement before the 25th of February.

I got the idea to telephone my friend Maleffroi to find me a job as a porter or museum guard in the next forty-eight hours. I was too late. He had just filled his last available opening for an office boy.

"Why the devil did you wait until today to ask me for a position?"

"But how was I to guess that the measure would affect me? When we dined together, you didnít tell me..."

"If I may remind you, I specified in no uncertain terms, that the austerity measure would affect all non-essential personnel."